I think you should go out with your camera more, and mess with the results less

I think it's your best portrait so far, by a HUGE margin.

I don't think the out-of-focus part of the tree distracts at all; if anything, it keeps attention on the subject. I agree with you that the hand is important to keep in the frame.

Damn! I meant to say, of course, no.. A lenses are dreadful, don't even think of buying any.... leave them all for meeeeeeee...

Joking apart, I doubt if there'll be many bargains to be had. With the new Pentax DSLRs getting more popular, and A lenses working so well with them, I expect their value will hold up well.

Manual focus A lenses will be absolutely fine, when set to A.

All the metering modes are available, and work. I use an SMC A 50mm F1.7 with the K10D. I've had it for more than 20 years, and I wouldn't dream of selling it. I have three other A-series lenses and they're fine too.

There are exposure issues using A-lenses in manual mode (ie setting aperture on the lens rather than with the camera), but if you keep it set to A there's no problems.

It is in the manual somewhere, but press the function button (Fn), and then "arrow up" to select the "Drive mode". You get 3s with the remote.

This sort of 200-500 perhaps?

http://www.bobatkins.com/photography/reviews/sigma_200-500_28.html

I'd be interested in your experiences with this lens. I've just acquired one as well, and overall I'm quite disappointed with it.

I've compared it with the Sigma 400mm (PKA, manual focus), and the only time the 600mm is sharper is when the the 400mm is wide open at F5.6.

At F8, they're pretty comparable, and at F16, the 400mm is considerably sharper - even taking into account the additional cropping and enlargement that you need with the shorter focal length.

Once you take into account the unpleasantness of the out-of focus areas obtained with the mirror lens, I'm starting to think that it was a waste of money getting it.

It is light, though, and it is physically quite short.

I've taken a lot of shots of the moon recently, most of which were rubbish.

A couple of the less rubbish ones are
http://i162.photobucket.com/albums/t244/chris5gd/Public/IMGP2385-1b.jpg
and
http://i162.photobucket.com/albums/t244/chris5gd/Public/MoonPretotality.jpg

They were taken on the K10D, with a Sigma 400mm lens, and cropped quite heavily.

Even though the moon was full, and therefore relatively large in the frame, spot metering still seemed to overexpose.

I think the "fiddle about" approach is more likely to get good results.

Another thing to remember, is that the movement of the moon is surprisingly rapid, and the longer the focal length of the lens the more of the frame it will cover in a given time. So keep the exposures short as far as you can. Maybe bump the ISO up and use the noise reduction feature of the K10D (which is on, by default, ISTR).

You might also be interested in this thread:

https://www.pentaxuser.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=3993&highlight=

Please will you write my marketing blurb when I come to re-sell my Sigma 600mm mirror lens?

Nice self-portrait... I assume this was with the remote, and the 3s mirror-up delay...